


The Wounds He Bore

by Pippin4242



Category: Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle
Genre: Gen, M/M, background yuki/touya, gore mention, ship tagged as a future trajectory kind of deal, shout out to the reader who wanted more kurofai and mental health
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-15
Updated: 2019-05-15
Packaged: 2020-03-05 23:15:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,211
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18838765
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pippin4242/pseuds/Pippin4242
Summary: In Piffle World, Kurogane and Fai have a quiet night to spend together. But old traumas nip too close at the heel.





	The Wounds He Bore

There is a gaping hurt in that man's heart.

\---

You travel with a foreigner, more foreign and strange than any you've met in your life. Every part of him is woven from strangeness – hair with a texture you've never seen before, skin different to any other, eyes which gleam with an unnatural hue – more like a precious stone than a part of a human's natural body.

You two men are naturally separate. By all rights you should never have met, never even imagined the existence of men like each other. You are hewn from different social structures, with different ideas of fashion, of rank, of manhood, different ideas of strength, different ideas about protecting children; difference heaped on difference, until it becomes a wonder the translation spell can function at all.

Your differences spill sometimes, and the two of you disagree in front of the children, who so desperately need you two to present a strong, reliable core for your broken, confused little team. At times like that the strange man is an obstacle. A hindrance. Vexed by the difficulties in your path you barely catch yourself about to speak sharply regarding this thing or that thing – and these are things which don't matter at all, in the wider scheme of things,

And yet, somewhere along the journey, this man has started meaning more to you. You catch his eye more often, as he watches over the children. His gaze flicks up to yours, just a moment at first – later, it lingers for longer. Sometimes when your glances touch, you're forced to look away again, caught in the act of caring.

You don't remember when you first started catching that otherworldly gaze in the net of your own. Maybe the Country of Fog, maybe later. But now you're used to those eyes, you're starting to think you can see things deep within them you hadn't previously imagined. Things the man's excitable, energetic front had deterred you from ever fishing for before.

Sometimes you watch him, happily working away with one or more of the children at his side, and you think: there is something wrong with this picture. There's something too wild in his eyes, something trapped and hurting, frightening and wrong.

You hope you will never have to meet it face to face, and have to stare it down.

\---

Piffle World, night. Impossibly complex buildings with their repeating designs twinkle out through the darkness like stars dragged to Earth with magnets. Vehicles outside swoosh by with a tinny ring; strange at first, and then as settling and predictable as the wind. The children are with the enthusiastic little businesswoman, and aren't expected to return to your shared lodgings tonight. Exhausted from the long day the five of you shared in the garage, your companion throws himself backwards onto the broad bed with abandon, arms akimbo.

As you turn from the window to see the man anew, it's clear that a trace of that wild look is back again, crawling around his exhausted, pale face, perhaps from the moment he lowered his guard.

“Want me to get you a glass of water?” you ask your companion, in the kindest voice you can muster.

In return you get nothing more than a growl, and a back turned against you.

You worry. Obviously you are stronger than him, and more experienced in a fight, but if he lashes out, do you really want to have to explain to the children why you've harmed one of your little family unit? They've already faced enough.

You compose yourself, with a breath to centre you, and step with light, careful footsteps over to his side. He's hurting, and you need him to pull himself together. Because if he goes rogue, your party is down by one competent adult, and your chances of seeing out the wish you've sacrificed something so great for are diminished exponentially.

“I didn't see you take any food when the children and I were having breakfast,” you admit to him, and seat yourself at the edge of the bed. It's oddly soft, another piece of futuristic furnishing.

“You should go,” he replies curtly, his voice raw and wrong.

“Look,” you try to reason. “The children need us to –”

“Go _away_ ,” he hisses, coiled in the duvet.

“You'd feel better if you had some dinner,” you continue, picking through your words carefully. “I can bring something to the room if you like.”

He moans and buries his face in the covers. It's an animal noise, starting low, and ending high in confusion at his own pain.

You remember a fox you saw once in the woods near the castle, its paw caught in a snare, not set by you. Its flesh was blackened and rotted, and the creature stank. It looked at you with mad amber eyes with nothing left behind them. In your fear and mercy you used your adolescent skills to lash out, killing it in a single stroke. You found yourself hating the hunter in that moment, safe in the crawling knowledge you'd never had to kill for your meat – but more, you hated the fox for its need and pain.

You don't like dealing with unpredictable people. Drunks are easy, the sick are easy, the elderly and bewildered, easy. They come from a mould. The drunks want another drink, or a fight, and it's simple to equip them with the one or evade the other. The sick need comfort and rest. The elderly, reassurance. And so people think of you as competent, good with other humans. The truth is that your castle of understanding is constructed on foundations of sand, and should someone behave illogically, outside your field of reference, it makes your stomach twist and your teeth hurt with the worry of it.

He'd obviously feel at least a little better if he ate, so why won't he accept food?

What would you want, if it was you? Obviously you'd never lose control around other people like this. You're used to bending with the blows and showing your bravest, strongest face. You'd thought he was good at hiding pain. You'd thought him stronger than this.

You would want to be with the one closest to your heart, of course. That would be the only thing which would truly put you at ease. But that was hardly possible, and so, you realise, you too would wish to be left alone.

Clearly not an option.

“I'm sorry. I know you don't want to talk.” You very slowly place your hand between his shoulderblades. Even through his shirt, his body feels too hot, his breathing, ragged. “I'm really sorry. I want to let you spend some time alone too. But I need to sleep here tonight as well, and the children might come in and want something.”

You take a deep breath, feeling sick to your stomach.

“I know you don't want to let me see you like this, but maybe we should try to do something. I don't think you've been your usual self all day, really.”

He twists to look up at you, accusatory and tired and hurting. His eyes are reddened and his face so pale. There's a streak of clear wet snot under his nose, and a face in this condition somehow seems less foreign to you than his usually does. And he looks so much younger to boot. You feel real sympathy for him now, not just fear, nor just determination to remove the problem before it impacts upon the childrens' mood.

Instinctively, you use the soft sleeve of your jacket to wipe his nose, and discreetly dab at the corners of his eyes. With him, somehow, it doesn't feel wrong.

“Don't want to talk,” he mutters, unresisting.

“I know. I'd let you stay here on your own if I could, but I think under the circumstances we need to just – push 'this' away, whatever it is. I don't think we can deal with it appropriately, given our positions in this little party of ours.”

“I'm fine,” he says, in a small, distant voice. His hot hand paws vaguely at your arm. “I'll eat something in a bit. I think I might have forgotten to.”

You can think of so many things that might be catching up with him. Maybe he longs for his castle, or the structure and order which came with working directly under his beloved monarch. It could be the climate, the food, the sadness of the princess's pain.

You offer him all you can. “I'll go and fetch you something from the kitchens, unless you really don't want me to.”

He says nothing.

You close the door tightly as you leave.

\---

City night. The air has cooled rapidly, and you wonder how the people who live here know what to wear from one minute to the next.

You have no idea where the kitchens are. You have no idea where Mokona is, and whether you'll leave the confines of the translation spell like this. In this swirling mass of inscrutable mechanical activity, you're just a single pebble, tossed to the bottom of a stream.

But there's a young man with dark hair on the other side of this plaza, running a stall selling something hot and steaming. You can't read the text above his head, or the menu, but you can smell meat and hear sizzling vegetables. His over-earnest face is streaked with sweat and he pushes his floppy black fringe back from his eyes with the back of his hand as he stirs and prods at a large flat cooking surface. He flashes a small, professional smile at you, and shouts something over his shoulder as you approach.

“Hi,” you manage, trying not to think of the fox's wet eyes or its useless leg, hanging from the wire loop as meat.

A second lanky young man emerges from an impossibly small booth within the stall, and bowls a pack of bread to his companion. “Ah!” he blurts, seeing you for the first time. He adjusts his glasses in embarrassment. “Sorry,” and, apparently not knowing what else to do, he goes back into the booth – more of a cupboard – and shuts the door behind himself.

The first employee laughs silently, looking at the closed door in affection.

You feel a sudden affinity for these two, and breathe out the tension you didn't know you were holding in your shoulders.

You put your hands palms down onto the counter and lean in. Crumbs prickle your skin.

“What do you recommend for two men in need of a bit of comfort?”

The stranger looks pensive for a moment, as if there could be a wrong answer, as if he could be misreading you. You do not look away. He snaps into action. “Hot food, hot drinks, salt, fat. Cheese,” he declares decisively, adding several rich yellow slices to the hotplate. “Anything either of you can't or won't eat?”

“None I know of,” you agree, noting there seems to be no raw fish in sight.

“Oi, Yuki!” he calls into the cupboard. “Two coffees, do 'em how you like 'em!”

 _“I'll just be a moment!”_ emits the cupboard faintly, and there's the sound of boxes being suddenly shuffled, as Yuki tries to cover his embarrassment with a fake task. You smile at Yuki's colleague. Something about them seems so familiar right now. He smiles back, and you can feel how much he loves his fumbling friend. There's a moment of recognition between you.

The young man's hands move as fast as fish darting in shallow water. Two large, long pale buns are slapped open onto the hotplate as he selects the two most enormous sausages you've ever seen.

Yuki reappears from the cupboard with an air of wounded dignity, and starts pouring coffee into two card cups, stirring with a tiny stick, adding precise amounts of this and that flavour and thickener. You think perhaps you can smell chestnuts.

The sausages are enrobed in their buns, atop a heap of fried onions. Yuki's coworker– his close companion? – squirts a yellow paste over them, deftly adds the cheese slices, folding them into triangles with a flick of his spatula, and heaps the concoction with a shredded, acid-smelling vegetable. He wraps each in thin paper and lowers them into a bag just as Yuki finishes, and puts the two coffees in on top.

“Twelve ninety-five,” they both say simultaneously, and, catching each other's startled glances, break into laughter.

\---

You're torn between wanting to run back to his side and to never go back at all. You settle somehow for an embarrassed amble. The handles of the paper bag feel smooth and reassuring in your hand: you are doing something tangible to help him. Getting food to share had seemed right, even though you're not hungry. If you make yourself equal to him, perhaps he won't hate you as much.

You have never known how to fix people. Only how to get from one day to the next without stopping.

You open the door incautiously, irritatedly aware that you're forcing this casual air. He isn't on the bed – he's sat up, staring out of the window, his hair lopsided and pink lines from the creased covers embedded in his cheek.

He must have just pulled himself away from the bed before you arrived.

“There's food,” you hear yourself say lamely. He nods curtly and lurches to his full height.

“It smells good,” he allows. His voice is a little quieter than usual, but it no longer trembles.

“Looks good too,” you agree, pulling the covers tight over the bed. In the absence of a dining table, you feel an indoor picnic is your most comfortable option. This is the sort of thing you two would usually fight over, but he takes one look at you and kneels primly opposite you on the bed.

You take off your jacket and lay it down, thinking of keeping out crumbs or grease spots. You put the bag on top of it and the shifting angle causes a wafting scent to escape. His taut expression softens; the food really is inviting. Silently, you thank the kind star those kids were born under.

You press a wrapped bun into his open hands, and take one for yourself, gingerly balancing the shredded vegetables as you unwrap it. “There's coffee in the bag too,” you say, blandly.

He takes one coffee out carefully, and, leaving his bun on your jacket, cautiously removes the lid and inspects his drink. “Smells sweet.”

“I let them make it whatever way they thought would be cheering. Don't worry, I didn't tell them much.”

He puts the lid down onto your jacket, and cautiously sips the hot concoction.

His eyes flick up to yours. You meet them.

“Do you need me to explain myself?” he asks, a little wanly.

“It might clear things up a bit.” You take the first bite. It's an explosion of flavour. The mystery vegetable is pickled, warmed through by the rest of the food. The sausage is smokey and dense and rich. The onions are caramelised, the sauce tangy, the cheese comforting and thick. Even the bland-looking bread has a good bite to it.You wish you could cook like this.

“There's –” he says suddenly, “there's, um, something purple –” and he pushes his thumb into a slot at the bottom of the cup, which presses outwards and reveals a nestled little pastry, topped with an artificial-looking purple icing, dotted with tiny white sugar stars.

“Dunk it, maybe,” you suggest, and continue intrepidly into your monstrous mess of a meal.

He does, and takes a bite, chewing thoughtfully.

“It's good.” He sighs, tightly. “And there's really nothing wrong, that's why it's hard to talk about.”

You doubt that somewhat, but have a mouth full of sausage, and find it hard to respond.

He's only taking small sips of his coffee, but it's something.

“I woke up feeling bad, forgot breakfast and lunch, and ended up feeling worse. That's all.” He finishes the remainder of his pastry in one bite.

You eat for a while, enveloped in fairly affable silence, as he slowly appreciates his coffee. You weren't sure if it was his kind of thing, but today, at least, he seems to be enjoying it.

You are trying to leave space for him to speak up about his real feelings, uncharacteristic though this is for him.

He finishes his coffee, and carefully places the empty cup and discarded lid into the bag.

He opens the bun in his lap, and his eyes light a little, clearly pleased with what he's seeing, clearly not having observed your identical, nearly-finished serving. It's an incredible relief to see him this animated again, and you feel the knot in your gut from earlier begin to loosen.

He holds the bun close to his face, and inhales, closing his eyes for a moment. “Smells good.”

You gulp down your last bite and suck your fingers clean as politely as you can manage. “Do you feel that bad frequently?” you interject, before he can take a bite.

“No. Sorry. I don't know how to stop it from happening when it does.” There's no malice in his tone. It really does sound like he doesn't have any answers.

“When did it first happen? If you don't mind me asking?” You take your coffee, nibble the edge of your pastry, and then try dunking it. It swells to a fluffy texture in the drink.

“I lost my mind for a short spell as a boy. Following intense trauma.” His tone is emotionless, but he more or less sounds like himself again. He takes a large bite of his bun, with every sign of enjoyment – diminished, but present.

“It goes back to that?” you ask, intrigued as you eat your pastry. You can't imagine being so open about your feelings, and you're honestly impressed that he can be so bold. You prefer to build careful structures and routines so that you never ever have to consider how you actually feel about anything. There's a certain manly strength to those pink-rimmed eyes and that lopsided sweaty hair right now, and it makes you feel more like getting to know him than ever.

He swallows his mouthful. “It's not like I feel the same as I did then. Just sometimes I wake up with this sense of dread, or – despair, or something. It comes down too hard. I think it switches all my feelings off. I usually just work instead of dealing with it, I guess, and eventually it goes away again. But it's hard to do that when we're on a journey.”

“I want the children to look upon us as reliable,” you admit. The coffee is incredible, and happens to be exactly to your taste.

“Yeah. They don't deserve any worse than they're already dealing with,” he agrees, and takes an enormous bite of his bun. Your heart swells proportionately. “This is really good. Thanks, Fai.”

“You're welcome,” you say, and you realise you really mean it. You reach over to touch his hand gently, and he gives you a half-hearted grin.

In return you gift him what you're pretty sure is a genuine smile.


End file.
